Diet for IBS

One thing is for sure: There cannot be one diet for IBS that is the same
for everyone - different people react to foods in different ways - but
there are some foods that are more likely than others to cause flare-ups.

Let's consider a few:

After you've read the article, see whether you can answer the following questions:

What are the compounds in milk that often can cause problems?

Are beans to be excluded from the IBS diet?

Why are sugars and fatty foods often a problems for people with IBS?

Should you include more fibre or eat a low-fibre diet?

How can stress affect your symptoms?

Dairy Foods and IBS

Although children can usually enjoy milk and cheese to their hearts'
content without apparent problems, up to 70% of adults worldwide produce insufficient amounts of
the enzyme lactase needed to digest the sugar lactose found in dairy foods.

In people who don't produce this enzyme or don't produce enough, this can cause sometimes severe symptoms of IBS.

Some people can be intolerant to casein, the protein in milk, and this too can cause flare ups of the symptoms.

To
find out whether dairy foods are a problem in your case, you can try to
cut them out of your diet for 2 to 3 weeks. If milk is a problem you
should find that your symptoms disappear.

According to Dr. David
E. Beck, MD, chairman of the department of colon and rectal surgery at
the Ochsner Clinic in New Orleans, you don't necessarily have to give up
milk and cheese entirely.

Over time, you'll get a good idea of
how much of a dairy food you can enjoy without having problems. So for
some people it's possible to include some dairy products in their diet
for IBS.

Beans and IBS

It's no surprise that beans often don't agree with people who have
IBS - they generally produce quite a lot of gas.

For this reasons many people
exclude them altogether from their diet for IBS, which is a pity considering the numerous health benefits of beans.

But you don't
have to rule them out entirely, says Dr. Beck. You may find that some
kinds of beans bother you more than others and some don't bother you at
all. So try different ones and you may find that you can safely include some of them in your IBS diet.

To help reduce gas, flavour your beans with fresh or ground ginger (a natural laxative), even cook them with it.

Sugar and Sweeteners

Another food that's hard to digest is the natural sugar fructose
found in soft drinks and apple and pear juices, says Samuel Meyers, MD,
clinical professor of medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New
York City.

One study found that half of all IBS patients suffered intestinal distress after eating about an oz./28g. of fructose.

Sweeteners like sorbitol, which are found in diet candy and chewing gum, can also be a problem.

One
study of 42 healthy adults detected sorbitol intolerance in a
surprising 43% of whites and 55% of non-whites after they ate a mere ten
grams of sorbitol - the amount in five sticks of sugarless gum, five
sugar-free mints or a tablespoon of dietetic jam.

For many people
with IBS, cutting back on these high-sorbitol foods
may be all it takes to ease their discomfort. Read the labels carefully if you're not sure.

Fatty Foods and IBS

A common cause of IBS flare-ups is fat. This is because the bowel
normally contracts following a high-fat meal. For people with IBS, these
normal contractions can be extremely painful, Dr. Meyers explains.

Getting
no more (and preferably less) than 30% of your total calories from fat
will go a long way toward calming an irritable bowel, he says.

A
sure way to eat less fat is to cook your own meals rather than eat out
or buy ready meals, says Paul Millea, MD, assistant professor of family
and community medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

Restaurants prepare food with their own benefit in mind, not
yours. As a result, the food you eat at most restaurants is loaded with fat
and low in nutrients.

Fibre in the Diet for IBS

Another problem with high-fat food is that they are low in fibre, and fibre is the key to avoiding IBS flare-ups for several reasons:

Insoluble fibre soaks up water as it passes through your intestines, helping to bulk
up, weigh down and soften your stools, so the intestine doesn't have to
squeeze as much to move them along, Dr. Beck says.

Both kinds of
fibre are important because together they help sweep things along, from
your stomach to your intestines to your stools and out.

Getting
the right type of dietary fibre also will help relieve both diarrhoea
and constipation, which often occur in people with IBS.

The Daily Value (DV) for fibre is 25 grams. As a starting point, Dr.
Millea tells his patients to add a bowl of bran cereal to their diet for
IBS every day and build up from there. "Most people will be surprised
at how it affects their gastrointestinal system," he says.

According
to Gerald Friedman, MD, associate professor of gastroenterology at
Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, dietary fibre, eaten over an
extended period of time, can actually "correct" some of the abnormal
motor patterns of the colon common in irritable bowel syndrome.

So it can help slow down or speed up contractions, helping in constipation or diarrhoea.

What to Do When Including Fibre in Your Diet for IBS

Please Note:

If you have IBS and want to start eating more fibre, do so gradually.

Eating more fibre when your body isn't used to it can bring on even more
digestive problems.

Also some people are intolerant to gluten, present in wheat and other cereals, and experience more intestinal problems when they increase their fibre intake.

You need to give your body time to adjust.
Start slowly by adding more fibre-rich foods to your diet a few at a
time over the course of several weeks or months.

And be sure to drink lots of water, which fibre needs to work well.

Whether you need to add more fibre and which type of fibre is best for you, will depend on the type of IBS you suffer from.

Wheat and IBS

Ironically, the top offending food in many studies on IBS is wheat -
the very remedy most physician prescribe to relieve IBS symptoms.

In fact, many people report that they feel worse after eating the recommended bran.

The
reason why it's difficult to make the link between wheat and IBS
symptoms is that people eat it all the time and it's only when they
change their habits that realise what's causing their symptoms.

So
if you're intolerant to wheat adding bran to your diet for IBS, even in
small amounts, would cause sudden problems and withdrawing it would
bring about relief from the symptoms. This is where an elimination diet
would prove to be beneficial.

Eat Smaller Meals

The more food you put into your body at any one time, even if they're
all foods that you've found are suitable for your IBS diet, the harder
the intestines have to work. And that can cause problems for people with
IBS.

Having several small meals is usually easier for the body to
handle than having two or three big meals, according to Douglas A.
Drossman, MD, professor of medicine and psychiatry of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill School of Medicine.

Stress and IBS

IBS is hardly ever seen in people who are retired because its symptoms are commonly brought on by stress, says Dr. Millea.

When we're under stress we typically reach for foods that exacerbate IBS, such as coffee, soft drinks, chocolate and fast food. That's like throwing gasoline onto the fire for most people with IBS, says Dr. Millea.

We can't really avoid stress altogether, but we can be aware of the choices we make when we're under stress.

We
can avoid stimulants such as caffeine and alcohol, add as much fibre to
our diet for IBS as we can, avoid eating out and be sure to get enough
sleep and exercise.

If giving up coffee sounds impossible, you could try drinking less, perhaps limiting yourselves to a cup or two each
day, keeping in mind that both regular and decaf coffee make the bowel
more sensitive.

Steps to Work out Your Diet for IBS

Here in a nutshell the things you could do to try to take control of
your IBS symptoms, as well as what to do to identify your problem foods
and what to include in your diet for IBS:

If you haven't been officially diagnosed with IBS, see a doctor to rule out other possible causes of your discomfort. Many more serious problems have been overlooked because of self-diagnosis.